Bachmann campaign: She knows Iran has no U.S. Embassy

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November 30, 2011 - 10:48 PM

Michele Bachmann has been known for factual errors in the past, but as she runs for president, she's fighting back.

On Wednesday, seemingly based largely on a tweet from an NBC reporter in Iowa, report after report after report berated Bachmann for saying in front of a "Waverly IA crowd that were she president, "we wouldn't have an American embassy in Iran."" As the tweet noted, the United States severed ties with Iran in 1980.

All day long, Twitter lit up with unkind commentary about the comment.

But, by Wednesday evening, Bachmann's campaign sent out a release entitled: "Bachmann Makes Statement Clear on U.S. Embassy in Iran."

"Congresswoman Bachmann is a member of the House Select Committee on Intelligence and is fully aware that we do not have an embassy in Iran and have not had one since 1980. She was agreeing with the actions taken by the British to secure their embassy personnel and was speaking in the hypothetical, that if she was President of the United States and if we had an embassy in Iran, she would have taken the same actions as the British. Her remarks are being taken out of context, given that she has spoken on this subject several times in the past 24 hours and made it clear that she knew we did not have an Iranian embassy. As she has previously stated, President Obama has taken his eye off of Iran, the most significant security threat in the region, and allowed them the luxury of time to move toward obtaining nuclear weapons. She will never allow Iran to obtain nuclear weapons that would threaten our ally Israel and the United States.”

The same day Stewart said the media took Bachmann's comments out of context, Bachmann went after the media on her own.

According to the Des Moines Register, Bachmann said that: "Americans “know that stories aren’t reported fairly or accurately,” Bachmann said in response to the question about the media. “And I can tell you from personal experience that is 100 percent true. And it’s disgusting to see. It’s absolutely disgusting. Because who that hurts is our system of government.”"

Worth noting: On Nov. 7, Bachmann claimed she doesn't "rag about the media. That’s not my thing. It is a relationship that we have to have…I work with them.”